I had a meeting with some Human Resource managers yesterday about how geographically broad companies can induct their staff. I had seen a presentation at a seminar about a new induction sytem one of the banks uses which had some good underlying principles, but staff still had to travel great distances, so uptake was still improving, but still not excellent. So I started thinking about what could be done… then I had a conversation that brought me back to reality.
When I spoke of the possibility of e-Learning, I was met with great enthusiam for “self-paced modules”, made from death-by-powerpoint style slides which are apparently the be-all and end-all of e-Learning. I need not mention that death by PowerPoint doesn’t rate well, but are self-paced modules really appropriate for staff induction? Maybe that depends on the context for some people, so possibly I’ll get disagreement, but for me the answer is a distinct “no”.
What does sitting someone in front of a computer with noone on the other end for the first few hours of their working life with a organisation tell them about that organisation? Probably little about the content, and more about a low priority on people, which is definitely not the case. We are alienating our people! Will reading about our values from a computer (albeit showing video and words) really get people to live our values? Or will they just know what they are and feel a bit fuzzy.
I think the problem with using isolated self-paced individual modules for induction is that there is no interaction or relationship building. There is no opportunity for social or informal learning as you are speaking with a computer that has noone on the other end. Or if you are like me, you may engage in conversation with your monitor. Either way - there’s noone listening out there.
Perhaps a better way would be to divide the induction into transaction and transformational, as this particular bank has done, then determine the most appropriate method to deliver both. Perhaps an area/branch/line manager could deliver transactional training, and the rest could be done using a series of webinars so that employees can interact and connect with each other over a broader geography via a computer.
There are many options both non-techonlgy and technology related I am sure, but the underlying principle surrounds why technology is chosen, if chosen at all. Selecting an e-Learning technology is like choosing a saucepan to cook with - you don’t make a selection based on which is the prettiest, best looking or most personable - you make a selection based on which is most suitable for the task at hand.
I have to admit. I am biased. Probably by my generation, probably by what I’ve been taught, probably by my learning style. I don’t really like boring self paced “click next here and read these words” kinda stuff. I mean those robotic recorded presentations which aren’t conducive to dialogue. There’s noone to talk to. I get a bit lonely when I have to learn this way. I go a bit nuts and talk with my monitor sometimes, but it never talks back. Like the content, it doesn’t care what I’m doing
Ultimately I like interaction with others. I tend to believe that humans are social beings, and as such a level of interaction and dialogue will help learning. So if I am going to have a message “banked” into my head non-interactively, like you’re dropping a coin in there without my consent, you’ve got about one and a half minutes to do it. How did I figure this out? Well, I’d read some of the literature saying similar stuff about keeping things short a while back and gone “yeah, yeah, yeah ok”, but being the pragmatic learner that I am, it was thoroughly reinforced when I was checking out some stuff on YouTube to make some “bytes” to reinforce our systems updates. Introductions over about fifteen seconds had me frustrated, and if I hadn’t gotten the point by the ninety second mark the time was up. Harsh? Yes. Although, it did back up the literature… and I can’t be the only one out there. The literature came from somewhere afterall.
Coincidentally, while I was cruising YouTube I found a short video called “This is not e-Learning” which sums it up perfectly. Thanks Dukados1!
So please, if you’re going to give me a brain dump, do it quickly, my monitor isn’t a talkative type.
A dilemma I came across recently was that of the transactional trainer in an e-Learning 2.0 environment. Do transactional trainers fit in this landscape? My answer after being subjected to an online lecture is, well, no not really. Can a “banking” concept of learning fit in what is essentially a collaborative environment? I believe that a change of mindset is required, otherwise we are behaving as “the sage on the stage” but in an online environment, and I don’t think our learners will put up with that. We have to raise the bar. Our audiences are not captive when they are online, we need to engage our learners rather than just dumping information on them.
So how do I go about changing a transactional trainer’s mindset when hosting a webinar? I certainly don’t have a solid (or wobbly for that matter) answer, and I can’t seem to find any cheap easy tricks for now. The key, I think lies within educating the transactional trainers about social e-Learning theory, but how? I know that I am pretty attached to my personal theories about how people learn, and I would be devaluing these trainers to suggest that they hold any less conviction about their beliefs than me. If the trainers are not familiar with technology, maybe it is a matter of immersing them in the environment, and running sequential short online webinars about how to teach using technology. I think that getting them to run some five minute recorded practice sessions, which they watch back and reflect on with the group may help. This could be done several times, with their progressive efforts compared to their previous ones to show development. If they are already operating in the environment, maybe we could surreptitiously compare some “happy sheet” scores from the “presented” versus “facilitated” webinars and take discussion from there? Or if all else fails, maybe I can treat them to one really long didactic webinar about the importance of interaction with all annotation and chat functionality turned off and they can get a taste of “death by webinar”
Although I am on the cusp of what is considered Generation Y, I have never really identified myself too closely with the term. I like playing with new technology, I am often found on Facebook, but that I thought, was the limit of things… I mean, I don’t identify with alot of the other words used for Gen Y’s. I didn’t grow up around technology and couldn’t type until I left high school, I have a truly ancient mobile phone that does nothing except send and receive text messages and make and receive phone calls. But then I had an eye opening experience today that made me think… maybe I am not looking at myself closely enough…
I had to participate in a teleconference, as opposed to a webinar today. I didn’t like it. Nothing to do with my hands. Nothing to see on my screen. No screen to scribble on in the boring bits… so I put my phone on mute and checked my emails in one account, and chatted with a friend in another account. I felt I understood and participated in the teleconference too.
This prompted me to think about the way that I spend my spare time. I am known to Google everything and anything. I am often found doing 500 things on my computer all at the same time, usually instead of watching TV (TV can’t talk back, and I can only watch one thing). Although I know I can’t USE things from wikipedia on my uni assignments, I find myself looking on it to clarify difficult concepts. And why would I buy a newspaper when I can just read it online?
